The Longest Running Joke
by Story Please
Summary: Written for Round 2 of the QLFC 5th Season for Pride of Portree. Augustus Gambol is the short, rotund proprietor of Gambol & Japes. He's seen it all, or so he thinks. That is, until he meets the Weasley twins...


Author's Note: Second Round for the QLFC- time to take a trip!

Round 2: Where Are We Going?

Team: Pride of Portree

Position: Captain

Location: Gambol and Japes

Word Count: 2890 excluding Author's Note

* * *

 **The Longest Running Joke**

Augustus Gambol groaned as his newest test product went up in flames... _literally_. He waved his hand at the cloud of stench that it produced and vanished the mess.

"Note to self," he muttered aloud, scratching into his notebook with a flourish of his fountain pen, "do not add Skunk Musk before Step 43 of the product fabrication process. Results: odiferous."

He looked up as the bell above the shop activated with a comical " _Fweeeeeeee_!" sound-effect.

Gambol frowned. "I'm sorry, but customers can't wear invisibility cloaks in the shop!"

From small children who wanted to give their peers a scare to adults seeking to prank their cheating spouses with something suitably unpleasant, Gambol served all without any judgement. The disclaimer on all of his products ensured that, if they were misused, he would not be held responsible. Anyway, most of his gags were harmless fun… for the prankster, at least.

The sound of small feet reached Gambol's ears and he smiled, his mustache curling up at the tips. Ah, children. They never had much money, but they were willing to try out new things in new ways. Besides, children were more regular customers than adults with a hankering for petty revenge.

Nimbly twisting off his stool, Gambol cast a Softening Charm on his shoes and snuck towards the source of the footsteps.

"Oh ho! And who do we have here?" Gambol reached down and grabbed the ears of two identical, red-haired boys who couldn't have been more than five or six years old.

The two boys squeaked with surprise at being caught, but quickly went quiet and turned to look up at their captor with mischievous eyes.

"Hello there! Twins, are you?" Gambol smiled, noticing the Terrible Toffee that one boy was holding. An excellent choice, for children loved sweets and neglected to read the wrapper label.

The other boy grinned sheepishly and held up a hand encased in a Snapping Inkwell.

"Ah, let me get that for you, then," Gambol said, tapping it with his wand. "Unhand him, you villain!"

The Snapping Inkwell immediately spat out the boy's hand and retreated with a whimpering noise rather like that of a kicked dog.

" _Brilliant_!" The twins chorused.

"Now, then, what can I do for you two chaps?" Gambol said. "Would you like the toffees? I warn you, they taste worse with each bite."

"We know," one boy said with a shrug. "We can read a bit, and gathered as much from the picture of the bloke there."

Gambol looked over at the poster that hung over the display, which currently featured a wizard with a green face and his tongue sticking out as though he were about to vomit. As he watched, the image slowly morphed back to a jolly-looking wizard placing one of the chews in his mouth and smiling until he chewed on it a few times, his face suddenly growing greener until he stuck his tongue out once again.

"Ah, yes, that's Japes' work. A real maverick with the magical painting if ever there was one," Gambol said with a sigh. He missed her terribly, but she'd gone and that was that. She'd fallen for that dashing pirate witch from Korea, and off they'd sailed into the sunset.

"Our mum and dad just sent our brother off to Hogwarts," the second boy said. "We want to get good at pranking for when we go."

"Oh, do you?" Gambol said, standing up, as his knees were beginning to hurt from squatting down to their level. "Well, then, I am very glad to make your acquaintance. My name is Mr. Gambol, and I offer the best to the aspiring prankster."

"I'm Fred Weasley," the boy on the left said.

"And I'm George Weasley," said the boy on the right.

They bowed in unison. "And we'd like ever so much to learn everything you know!"

"I'm afraid I don't take on apprentices that are shorter than I am. As you can tell, it's not a very difficult requirement, but you two are unfortunately unable to pass it," Mr. Gambol said, arching an eyebrow. "Where _are_ your parents, eh?"

Both boys looked as though they were about to protest, but Mr. Gambol held up his hand to silence them . "What do you take me for, boys? It is part of the Prankster's Oath never to snitch on a fellow prankster."

The boys smiled a bit shyly at him at this admission. They dug into their pockets and pulled out a few tarnished knuts, holding them in their outstretched palms.

"Hmm," Mr. Gambol said, "We'll be needing to get you a bit of change, then. Follow me!"

The two boys followed him to his cash register, but instead of opening it, Mr. Gambol pulled out two purple cards covered in gold foil. He embossed the names _George Weasley_ and _Fred Weasley_ on each card, respectively, with his wand.

"I give all my new customers a certified Prankster's card. It's got the Oath on the back, as you can see. Buy ten products, get a basic prank free. Buy twenty, get an intermediate inconvenience. Thirty or more, get a doozy."

He took their money, handed them their bag, and then walked them to the front door.

"Now, then, you two get into plenty of trouble, won't you?" he said.

"We promise!" they chorused together, skipping out the door.

"I'm sure you will," Gambol said softly to himself as he watched a red-faced woman stomp down the street, grab the boys by an ear each, and drag them back towards The Leaky Caldron.

* * *

"Oi, Gambol, how's tricks?"

Mr. Gambol hid his trembling hand behind his back and smiled reassuringly at the two boys who'd skipped up to his register with the confidence of long-time customers. Over the past few years, they had become Mr. Gambol's main product testers. They'd tried out his Beard Blaster pills, smeared Cyan Cream on their younger siblings' faces, and even used his Legstendables to get onto an amusement park ride. Each time they came down to Diagon Alley, they snuck away and told Mr. Gambol of their exploits. As they grew older, of course, these pranks became more sophisticated, and they had attempted to create joke objects without wands. There had been predictably explosive results, of course, but they _had_ made for entertaining tales.

"Ah, boys, what a lovely surprise!" he said, fiddling with his glasses. "Just working on some new tricks for you to try."

"Guess what?" they chirped. They, too, each held one hand behind their backs.

Mr. Gambol wondered if this was a tasteless joke on their behalf, but then remembered that he'd been careful to hide his painful hand tremors. He didn't want it to interfere with their usual banter. Though he'd always been short and rotund, Mr. Gambol had never experienced any infirmity other than the odd sniffle here and there. It only used to happen when he was casting complex spellwork, but recently it occurred more and more often. It filled him with shame.

Mr. Gambol felt the shaking in his hand subside. He quickly drew it in front of him to stroke his chin pensively.

"Is it a rainbow niffler, by chance?" he asked indulgently.

They shook their heads slowly and produced two wands, their wicked grins identical.

"Lepus Aures!" the boys shouted, and Mr. Gambol let out a squeak of surprise as something popped out of the top of his purple and gold jester hat. His new appendages twitched as he reached up to feel for them.

"Ah! Rabbit ears!" he exclaimed. "Good show, boys!"

"Well, er, we didn't exactly figure out how to make them disappear quite yet...but…" George smirked as Fred suppressed a giggle. Mr. Gambol removed his hat to find that the errant ears had gone a curious shade of violet and were busy tying themselves in knots.

"At least they aren't attached to my head!" Mr. Gambol said, relieved.

"As you probably guessed, it's our birthday today!" Fred said excitedly.

"April first. That's April Fools day, to be precise!" George said, tracing a spiral in front of him with sparks from his wand. He grinned and whirled his eyes around in a markedly silly manner that made Fred laugh so loudly that he fell over.

"Ah, so you'll be going to Hogwarts in the autumn, then," Mr. Gambol said a bit sadly. It surprised him a bit just how much he'd miss regular visits from the twins.

"Oh, don't worry," George replied with a wink, "we're still up for being product testers if you're willing to owl them to us."

"We reckon that if we're going to go down in history as the best pranksters in Hogwarts history, we'll need to keep everyone on their toes pretty continuously all year long," Fred said with a shrug. "Plus, what better advertisement for your wares than a couple of seasoned pranksters like us showing everyone what they can do?"

Mr. Gambol considered this. They had a point, and though eleven was far too young for him to offer the official apprenticeship that he was almost certainly going to offer to them once they were of age, he knew that this would be the perfect test run to make sure that they were up for the job. "Being a prankster isn't all fun, you know," he said, finally. "Wait, what am I saying? It's _great_ fun, but it's great fun _only_ when a prankster is dedicated to his art. I need to know - are you two up for the task?"

George and Fred looked at each other for a long moment and then rolled around behind Mr. Gambol in a surprisingly graceful somersault and pointed their wands at his behind.

" _Cauda Leporem_!" they shouted, and a little fluffy bunny tail popped out of the seat of his pantaloons.

Mr. Gambol held up his hands in surrender. "All right, all right! You've convinced me. Let's start with that list, shall we?"

Fred and George gave each other a high five before shaking Mr. Gambol's hands vigorously. "We won't let you down, sir!"

* * *

Mr Gambol's hands shook and his joints locked up as he tied the twine on his last owl post package. He had to admit that it had been a good year for business. As had the year before that, and the year before that. To be honest, each of the previous six years had been rather profitable, in no small part because of Fred and George's help. The Weasley twins had made up for the amount of stock they received for free and then some. They also helped out in the joke shop during the summers for extra money, which has been a godsend as Mr. Gambol had begun having entire days where his hands were practically useless. He'd started using his wand with his feet, often pretending that he was doing it as part of his prankster persona, but his casting was still fairly spotty. He'd accidentally engorged someone's owl a few days earlier with a stray shot.

The twins had begun using what they learned in classes and built upon it using books from the Hogwarts library, creating various products of their own. Some were rather simplistic, while others (such as their Puking Pastilles, which they had created completely on their own, and was the crown jewel of their Skiving Snackboxes) were unique enough that Mr. Gambol had begun to sell them in a special section near the register with a sign that proclaimed "Weasley Wizard Wheezes products have been tested and recommended by Gambol and Japes staff. Hours of fun await you!"

He split the profit 75%/25%, with himself receiving the smaller commission. In a way, he was benefitting himself, as the boys tended to use their profits for more product development anyway, but it didn't matter to the Weasley twins. Their interest in developing products bordered on obsessive, and they seemed to view every success as an excuse to push the envelope even further the next time.

This year, however, the boys seemed to be going all out. No, not _boys_ , but _adults_ , Gambol had to remind himself. They'd turned seventeen the spring before, and they had used all of their new rights to make mischief of the highest order.

Gambol approved, of course, but he was looking forward to seeing them at the end of the school year, for he had a whopper of a graduation present in mind. Though he was not a family member, his close ties with the Weasley twins were similar in nature. It was part of the Prankster's Oath, after all: "Every Prankster is a sister or brother to one another."

St Mungo's could do nothing for him. He'd waited far too long to go in for a diagnosis, and now the only measures he could take were daily potions that tasted like the wrong end of a camel. They slowed down the inevitable progression of the disease, but once it was done with his hands and arms, it would spread to his body. Lungs and hearts did not do so well with working irregularly. Though he'd hired a few people to work on his existing joke products, Gambol was embarrassed that he could no longer make them himself. What was worse was that he also could not create new products by hand as he'd been doing since he was a young man. In a way, he was living vicariously through George and Fred. It reminded him of his pranking days at Hogwarts with Melinda Japes. They'd been thick as thieves for years, but then she'd fallen in love with her pirate witch, and that had been that. They'd kept in touch by owl, of course, but it wasn't the same. The twins, though, they'd stick together no matter what. Gambol was certain of it.

* * *

The front door of the shop swung open, activating the silly noise charm for the first time that day. It had been a slow week for sales, though the number of owl orders to Hogwarts had increased exponentially as the year had worn on.

"Good morning!" Gambol said, sitting behind his desk, his hands folded neatly in front of him. They'd nearly stopped hurting, but he could barely wiggle his pinky fingers One shoe was off so that he could hold his wand between his toes, just in case.

Instead of the telltale sound of footfalls, he heard the rush of-

"'Ello there, Gambol! How's tricks!" Fred cried, sailing over Gambol's head on a broom at top speed.

"Thought we'd fly over and see you!" George crowed, swooping by moments behind his twin.

"Oh, this will be good, won't it?" Gambol replied, his mustache curling with anticipation.

"Yes, indeed," George said, taking a second lap around Gambol's head and landing next to his brother in front of the register. "We created a brilliant swamp!"

"A...swamp...I don't-"

"In the middle of the fifth floor corridor next to that horrible toad's office!" Fred said proudly.

"Even Peeves was impressed!" George continued.

"I...well. _Well_." Gambol hadn't realized that he'd stood up. He sat down heavily, blinking at the two boys from behind his spectacles. "It sounds like you two are well shot of school, then."

"We may have exaggerated our...post-Hogwarts plan," Fred said sheepishly.

"We may have mentioned a shop," George continued.

"Yeah, at your address," Fred finished.

"So I guess that means we're asking if we can lend a hand here," they said together.

Gambol stared at them. Then, his eyes crinkled with the laughter that hit his lips moments later. The twins stared at the laughing man, who had to bend his foot up at an uncomfortable angle to wipe the tears away from the corner of his eyes.

"Well," he said, when he'd calmed down enough to speak clearly, "It just so happens that I have a shop that needs minding."

"But what about-?"

Gambol slowly raised his arms and let the twins see his hands flop over at the wrist like the dead weight they were. "I need more than just a hand," he said sadly, "and that's no joke."

The twins grins disappeared and they left their brooms in a heap on the floor at once.

Gambol suddenly found himself looking at two identical concerned expressions.

"Is it bad?" Fred asked.

"Unfortunately, yes," Gambol replied.

"Can we do anything?" George asked.

Gambol smiled sadly. "There's only one thing that you can do. You can take my old shop off my useless hands, and you can make it a prankster's paradise. You'll do that for me, won't you?"

The twins looked at each other and then turned back to look at Gambol, their expressions guarded.

"Well," said George, "It's just...we're new to the whole shop thing…"

"...and even if your hands are on the fritz, that doesn't mean that your brain isn't up to snuff," Fred continued.

"So, we think that we might have a place for you on our research and development team," George said.

"That is, if you're up for the task?" Fred finished hopefully.

For the first time in over a year, Augustus Gambol felt his heart grow light. "You two have got yourself a deal," he said, offering his foot. "Now, then, how about we shake on it?"


End file.
